LibAnswers

What is happening and why?

From 1 April 2025, King’s – along with all other UK HEIs – will not have a ‘Read & Publish’ deal in place with American Chemical Society (ACS) to enable reading access to its journal titles plus Open Access (OA) publishing.

Despite extensive negotiations, the UK HE sector and the ACS have been unable to agree terms for a new deal. King’s has worked with other universities and our negotiating partner, Jisc to try and secure a new agreement. The proposals offered by the ACS are not viable and are likely to result in co-authored papers being ineligible for the next REF. A significant number of institutions will not be able to afford the levels of increases sought by ACS.  

JISC will now proceed to negotiate with ACS for a Read only agreement during April. Access to ACS content institutions subscribe to will continue uninterrupted during this process.

Below we have also listed additional ways users can find and access ACS content.

How can I access ACS journal content?
King’s students and staff continue to have access to all ACS journal content King’s subscribes to via our Catalogue and Discovery tool Library Search.

If the article is not available via King’s Library Search, you may be able find an open access version of it through one of the following options:

1. Using one of these free web browser tools to find published open access articles:
   1. Open Access Button Enter an article’s URL, DOI, title on the website to find free, legal, open access versions. It can be installed as a browser extension, then by clicking on it from a paywalled article, it initiates a search for an open version. If free access is not found, the service can contact the author directly to help them make the article available.  
   2. Unpaywall: Directly search an open, legal database of millions of millions of open access scholarly articles. It can be installed as a browser extension to connect to OA versions of paywalled articles.

2. Alternatively, you may be able to find a green open access version of the article in an online repository. You can search the King’s own repository PURE or other general or subject-specific open repositories such as arXiv , Chemrxiv , OSF Preprints, Social Science Research Network,  PubMed Central, Europe PMC.

If you are still not able to access the article you need, we may be able to obtain it for you via the library’s Interlending and Document Delivery service. For more info see How to place an interlending request

How can I publish an article open access in an ACS journal?   

Researchers without any external funding requirements can follow the standard route to publication and upload their final accepted manuscript to Pure, King’s institutional repository, where it can be made openly available after 12-month embargo. This will ensure compliance with the current REF open access policy.

Authors in receipt of external funding should get in touch with the Open Research Team, providing funding details, and library colleagues will be able to advise on available routes to compliance.

Authors are encouraged to not pay any Article Processing Charges (APCs) or Article Development Charges (ADCs) to publish in ACS journals to help reinforce the point that the fees they are charging are unaffordable for UK HEI and UK funders.